My car and Murphy’s Law

Murphy’s Law states that “anything that can go wrong at sea generally does go wrong sooner or later,” however a simple adaptation would make for Tyson’s Law “anything that can go wrong with a car, generally will go wrong sooner or later.”

I own a 1999 Ford Taurus. It is a car I bought about four years ago after what would have been my sophomore year of college. Before that time I drove a very old Hundai Elantra – a car on which the entire exhaust crumbled and fell to the ground while I was driving.

The Elantra was loud, but it only cost $30 when I made the purchase, and it lasted me three years. Sure, it didn’t work when the temperature got below freezing. And the car never once made a quiet get away. Still, it was fun to drive – sort of like a giant Go-Kart.

My Ford Taurus was supposed to be more reliable. After I first made the purchase I took the Taurus on a road trip from Moorhead to Wisconsin Dells for a fun mini-vacation. The drive was smooth, the car was quiet and we made our way without much of a problem.

It was only a few months later that my car was buckling and shutting down on the highway – without any warning or reason. It wouldn’t immediately start again, but would click on after about an hours wait as if nothing had happened at all. There was no check engine light and no grinding noises. It was as if nothing had happened.

Thousands of dollars later that problem was fixed – though I can honestly say I don’t know what ended up being the ultimate fix. But, that was just the beginning of my Taurus’ problems.

If you see me driving around you may notice I have a makeshift bumper duct taped together with some white tape. This is because while I was backing out of my driveway one day my breakline snapped. It was icy, so I thought I was slipping backwards. I jammed my foot into the spungy peddle, but I kept sliding backward until I struck a tree.

I repaired the breakline, so that only a year later it could snap on me again – this time when I was driving home from the interview for this job!

Murphy’s Law states that “anything that can go wrong at sea generally does go wrong sooner or later,” however a simple adaptation would make for Tyson’s Law “anything that can go wrong with a car, generally will go wrong sooner or later.”

My point it this: cars are a lot of trouble and they will try to kill you. Ok, that’s a little dramatic, but maybe it would be a good idea to take some of that tax refund you’re getting and put it into a car repair fund – because it will need repairs sometime this year.